He said at a recent press briefing that OFA “is this is a separate organization, as we’ve noted, the existence of which is perfectly appropriate and the White House will engage with it consistent in the way with it has engaged with a whole host of outside constituencies.”

It’s so “separate”, the President sent out email to his supporters on January 18, 2013, entreating them to join theorganization.

It’s so “independent”, it’s recruitment video was promoted by the First Lady from her White House office.

Remember when Organizing for Action – the so-called non-partisan 501(c)4 group aimed at disseminating and lobbying for Obama’s agenda – would release the names of its donors, especially the ones who give big to the organization. Well, they’ve decided to nix that, not that the liberal media care to note the reversal.The Washington Free Beacon reported today that:

President Barack Obama’s recently formed dark-money group Organizing for Action confirmed to the Center for Public Integrity Thursday that it would not release donor information such as employer and occupation despite collecting the data in its online donor application.

The Center for Public Integrity reports:

“Our voluntary disclosure will be posted on our website with the exact dollar donation, name and city and state of the donor,” Organizing for Action spokeswoman Katie Hogan told the Center for Public Integrity.

As a practical matter, a lack of employer and occupation information makes it more difficult for the public to determine the corporate, union or special interest ties donors may have.

It also complicates confirming their identities, particularly when they have common names. A similar issue arose when Obama’s inauguration committee released the names of its donors, but no other identifying information. …

Organizing for Action — the successor organization to Obama’s re-election campaign — is not compelled by law to release any of its donor information because it was established as a 501(c)(4) ”social welfare” nonprofit group and falls under the auspices of the Internal Revenue Service. It may raise and spend unlimited amounts of money, but electing politicians cannot be its primary purpose.

OFA has been accused by many of selling access to the president, which isn’t uncommon, but Obama campaigned against such business-as-usual politics when he ran in 2008. However, given this administration’s penchant to keep various parts of its governing apparatus hidden from the public – and the fact that the co-founder of the liberal ethics watchdog CREW is now the White House’ ethics czar – the watchdog community in D.C. has remained silent since OFA’s inception.